Marketta Gregory never meant to be a columnist. \x34I trained to be a newspaper reporter -- one who tried to her best to be objective. I covered religion for a few years and felt like it was the best job a curious woman like me could ever have.
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Marketta Gregory never meant to be a columnist. \x34I trained to be a newspaper reporter -- one who tried to her best to be objective. I covered religion for a few years and felt like it was the best job a curious woman like me could ever have. Every day I got to listen as people told me about the things that were most important to them, the things that were sacred. But the newspaper industry was changing and few papers could afford to have an army of speciality reporters. So, I moved to cover the suburbs where, as luck would have it, they have plenty of religion, too. Eventually, children came into the picture. One by birth and another two months later by foster care/adoption. I struggled to chase breaking news and be home at a decent hour, so I made the move to what we journalists call the dark side: I took a job in public relations. (Don't worry. I work for a great non-profit, so it's not dark at all.) When I gave my notice at the Rochester (NY) Democrat and Chronicle, the executive editor asked me to consider writing a column on a freelance basis. She didn't want the newspaper to lose touch with its religious sources, and she still wanted consistent faith coverage. I was terrified. It took me about 10 months to get back to her with a solid plan and some sample columns. And so it began, this journey of opening up my heart to strangers.\x34

I know it’s hard to be the younger one, the one who watches from the doorway as older kids leave for friends’ houses. With sisters 12 and 14 years older than me, I’ve been there. That’s why it struck such a chord with me when Benjamin said he wanted to go somewhere that I couldn’t see him.He wanted to leave the house without Mom and Dad. He wanted to be big, and at 4, his options were limited.Then, it struck me: He could play on our enclosed front porch while I sat mere feet away in the living room. He could have the sense of playing just out of reach, and I could know he was safe because I could see him through the window.He was beside himself when he heard the news. He raced around gathering up the supplies he would need to entertain himself. A write-on wipe-off board. A Bible. An imagination that somehow always finds its way back to Star Wars or Justice League heroes.I could see him sipping from his mug, arranging things on the rustic coffee table and settling into the cushions on his favorite outdoor chair. He was proud of himself. You could tell it in the way he carried himself.Within minutes he poked his head back inside the door.“I’m reading chapter one,” he said, carrying his Bible. “It tells all about friendships… and relationships.”I started to explain how chapter one is about creation, but I stopped myself just in time for the reality of what he had said to sink in.From start to finish, it is about relationships. Even the story of creation tells us God created man in his own image and then made woman, so they would not be alone. Then, God walked with them in the garden and delighted in their company.And after the fall? Well, God still wanted relationship – that’s what the rest of the book is about. The whole thing summarized.Benjamin is a bigger, wiser boy, than I realized.